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Although best known as the wife of C. S. Lewis, Joy Davidman was an accomplished writer in her own right, with several published works to her credit. Out of My Bone tells Davidmans life story in her own words through her numerous letters -- most never published before -- and her autobiographical essay "The Longest Way Round."

Gathered and expertly introduced by Don W. King, these letters reveal Davidman's persistent search for truth, her curious, incisive mind, and her arresting, sharply penetrating voice. They chronicle her religious, philosophical, and intellectual journey from secular Judaism to atheism to Communism to Christianity. Her personal engagement with large issues offers key insights into the historical milieu of America in the 1930s and 1940s. Davidman also writes about the struggles of her earlier marriage to William Lindsay Gresham and of trying to reconcile her career goals with her life as mother of two sons. Most poignantly, perhaps, these letters expose Davidmans mental, emotional, and spiritual state as she confronted the cancer that eventually took her life in 1960 at age 45.

Moving and riveting, Out of My Bone reveals anew the singular woman whom Lewis deeply loved and who influenced his later writings, especially Till We Have Faces.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

Journal of Inklings StudiesIn this delightful and beautifully produced volume, Prof. King introduces, presents and unobtrusively annotates Davidmans collected letters, which span a period of twenty-four years, from 1936 to her death in 1960. . . . The portrait Davidmans letters paint is scintillating and many-layered, and displays the entire palette of a mind that Lewis justly described as lithe and quick and muscular as a leopard. Don Kings clear introduction and apparatus, and his pertinent, learned and unobtrusive annotations, make this a volume equally useful to the scholar and the general reader. It cannot be recommended warmly enough.

About the Author

Don W. King is professor of English at Montreat College and editor of Christian Scholars Review. He is the author of over sixty articles on C. S. Lewis, and his other books include C. S. Lewis, Poet and Hunting the Unicorn: A Critical Biography of Ruth Pitter.

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

I've "lived" with this book for a week, and I still cannot stop staring at the undated jacket photo of young (twenty-something?) Joy Davidman. She's staring soberly into the camera, the flash reflecting in her watery eyes. She's stunningly beautiful and hauntingly present. A store browser might be swayed to buy the book on the merits of the jacket alone. But there's so much more to be revealed by reading the hefty volume of letters written by Joy Davidman, whose reputation might have been lost to history had she not married C. S. "Jack" Lewis, famed author of the Chronicles of Narnia series.

The first letters were written in 1936; at age 21, she already has a master's degree from Columbia and is corresponding about her poetic aspirations with Stephen Vincent Benét. This brings up a notable feature of the collection: it is designed for lay readers as well as literary types. The editor provides footnotes that give basic information on virtually all correspondents. If you don't happen to know the import of Benét in his time --- a Pulitzer Prize winner --- it's laid out for you right at the bottom of the page.

By age 30, she is a prize-winning poet and has published her first novel. She's a member of the Communist Party and an editor for its American magazine New Masses. She has married a fellow writer and Communist, William Lindsay Gresham, and is a mother. Many of the early letters focus on her own writing pursuits and also reveal her as a no-nonsense editorial mentor-critic. For example, she is quoted as saying, "What the words do not contain, you cannot add with punctuation.Read more ›

If you want to know more about the personal side of Joy Davidman, this is a good book for that. The author started with an over view on her life. There are a few notes here and there that give some context to what she was writing about. I think that it would have been better if the author had intertwined more of the overview section in between the letters. It was good to get a big picture up front, but as you read through the letters, it would have been better to get those specifics in between the letters. Overall a good read.

I found this collection of the letters of Joy Davidman to be extremely interesting. I was thrilled to gain the insight into her dramatic life. Dr. King did an outstanding job organizing these letters and filling in any gaps or misconceptions with a thorough explanation. This book is a valuable addition to my library. It should be welcome universally in personal collections especially when there is an interest in the life of C.S. Lewis.

Anyone who has read the Narnian series in its entirety, or who wants to do so, may be fascinated with spunky feisty Jill Pole who breaks the traditional mold of how a girl ought to behave in Lewis' day. I believe that Jill was, perhaps in part, based on his one true love: Joy Davidman Lewis.

Joy drank beer, and complained when there was not enough of it to her liking. She wrote fierce poetry. She showed courage in the face of an economic depression, a painful divorce, World War II, McCarthyism, and cancer. Her letters to family and friends show a constant display of strength, almost to the point of harshness. This was the woman who won C.S. Lewis' heart!

This cheering book, at times, makes me laugh at not only Joy's irony, but God's. She remarks in one letter "Jack's juveniles [the Narnian series including The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Prince Caspian, and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader] have a small steady sale . . . but we'll never get rich from those . . . the good thing is that they don't dwindle with time - but I think it's only the most successful juveniles that go on forever." While downplaying her cancer, she remarks about nasties such as financial nightmares and the fact that mild intestinal flu played hell with her beer-drinking! There is even a picture of Joy in 1958, wearing pants and wielding an air rifle!

While tea and shortbread have their place, Joy shows the very joy in beer, laughter, intellectual pursuits, and sheer chutzpah!Read more ›